


Diana Cavendish vs. the (Modern) World

by Hikarilie



Category: Little Witch Academia
Genre: Comedy, F/F, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-01
Updated: 2018-09-01
Packaged: 2019-07-04 08:11:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15837273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hikarilie/pseuds/Hikarilie
Summary: The prized pupil of Luna Nova faces her greatest educational challenge yet: the modern world with its bizarre intricacies, mannerisms and way too many buttons and screens.A series of short-but-not-really drabbles on Diana trying to learn stuff about the modern world with Akko & co.





	Diana Cavendish vs. the (Modern) World

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Akko's spending her summer at Diana's and they try to make breakfast. Diana sucks at it, press F.

It was a rather quiet Sunday morning at the Cavendish estate, the forecast promising somewhat of a chilly day. Perfect for staying under the blankets. And yet, Akko, in her usual red shorts and white shirt pajama combo, found herself being the unfortunate victim of a body who decided it'd rebel against the sacred tradition of sleeping-in on this most sacred of nap days, waking her up when the sunshine was only barely grazing the horizon with streaks of orange and purple.

The brunette sluggishly followed in the slow, rhythmic steps of her host, who still bore the long and silky cyan nightgown she'd used to sleep. Akko arched her back, and her joints popped very loudly in the large, echoing corridor they traversed. Akko followed the stretching with a pleased whoop, her body feeling a bit lighter. The blonde in front of her grimaced slightly, finding the noisy display a bit too uncouth.

The Japanese witch took in the sights of the mansion during their comfortably silent trek. She hadn't been able to look around much when she came to very heroically save Diana from her stupid decision, but now, as her summer guest, she could calmly analyze every inch of the chic chateau, filled with fancy vases and striking brass moldings running along the roof.

The house was a maze of hallways and the girl was sure she wouldn't be able to find her way back to the guest bedroom alone before she died of starvation, that's how big the place felt to her.

As for Diana, she was merely following her usual internal body clock, precise as the Big Ben itself, calibrated by years of rigorous study routines. At six sharp, every day, she was awake and today hadn't been an exception. It didn't take her more than a quarter hour to arrange her signature locks into something presentable and coiffed, gracefully hiding how she'd just woken up. That, coupled with a complexion that displayed no signs of exhaustion, puzzled the heiress' guest, who currently dealt with bags under her eyes and a hairdo that looked as though Alcor had build a nest for himself.

"How do you do it?" drawled Akko, her voice groggy from sleep.

"Hmm?" Diana stopped in her tracks and turned her head slightly backwards so the other girl would enter her peripheral vision. "What do you mean, Akko?"

Her response was a pair of arms stretched out and flailing around the vague shape of a square around her frame, as though presenting Diana and saying ' _like, all of you!_ '. "Do you even sleep, Dia? Are you sure you're not a robot fueled purely by workaholism?"

The blonde's thin lips ever so slightly curled into a small smirk. "Understanding my circadian rhythm and maintaining a balanced nutrition are my secrets, if you're curious. A witch must regard self-care if she is to keep herself at the peak of her abilities."

Akko closed her eyes and held her arm in front of her face, dodging a beam of criminally bright sunlight crossing through a stained glass window. 

' _Heck, even the windows look straight out of a movie._ '

"Yeah, I guess." She couldn't help but feel a pang of self-shame, considering half of her diet consisted of children cereals, milk and sweets, while the other half was still very devoid of any healthy food like vegetables.

Though Luna Nova had provided her enough potassium in her bloodstream to last a lifetime, if it counted for anything.

They finally reached a large set of double doors, far taller than Akko was. Behind the archway was a fairly large kitchen, lined from wall to wall with counters and cupboards holding several appliances and ingredients. A modest wooden door on the wall to their left held a pantry. A large counter in the center held two sinks, cutting boards, a set of knives and other materials of interest.

"Dang, fancy!" Though the sight of a larger-than-average kitchen wouldn't be the bee's knees to most people, to Akko, who was used to the quaint little kitchen back in her home with a small stove fighting for room with a fridge and a counter, this was mind blowing. 

"Hmm, I suppose." Diana closed the doors behind them slowly, so the squeaking of wood on metal wouldn't wake up the other residents of the manor earlier than necessary. "Now, breakfast service starts at eight o'clock." Akko whined loudly.

"That's almost two hours away, I'm gonna, like, starve to death!" The brunette sighed dramatically, arching her head back and pressing the back of her left hand to her temple. "When I leave these mortal coils, please give all my earthly possessions to my friends and my cute widdle puddy tat, Mr. Hoshi."

Diana raised an eyebrow. "Did you name your cat 'Star' because of the Shiny Rod, perhaps?"

Akko's eyes shot open, the wall to her right suddenly very interesting to look at. "N-no! I mean, maybe. Since when do you know Japanese anyway?"

"I learned a bit when I traveled to your country with my mom. I met another girl there who taught me the basics, though my memory of her is rather faint." The to-be head of the family to whom this manor belonged procured the cabinets, searching for anything edible. "In any case, we'll have to prepare breakfast ourselves. I usually just study from six to eight most mornings while waiting for service, but I won't subject my guest to waiting so long."

"For someone who talks so much about self-care, don't you think you're skipping a bit on morning food, Diana?"

The blonde lightly cleared her throat while devising a comeback. "It's not as though I'll die famished if I wait a couple hours to eat after waking up. Besides, even if their presence is not exactly the highlight of my day, I'd be remiss in not eating with my aunt and cousins."

Her brunette companion tutted. "Yeah, but, like, couldn't you at least make some food for yourself while you wait? Maybe a vitamin, or some toast with jam?" To her surprise, she was met with prolonged silence. "You… you know how to make those, right?"

Diana turned away, her face feeling warm. 

"Wow. I guess even _the_ Diana Cavendish has her blind spots, huh?" Akko giggled to herself, amused.

"W-well. While I did learn how to brew tea with my mother, the truth is I never had much reason to learn how to prepare food while growing up, given I had an entourage for that purpose. So my knowledge in the field is… limited."

The Japanese witch - and for the first time, currently most knowledgeable witch of the duo in something - closed her lips and opened them with a plop, a bit of a silly quirk born from her hyperactivity. "Well, what exactly were you planning to get us for breakfast, then?"

There was an encore of the previous silence. Now with a deeper blush on her cheeks, Diana shamefully presented a pack of crackers. Akko, not one to lose a chance, laughed evilly - drawing from her memories of Croix - and rubbed the palms of her hands against each other.

"Mwufufu! Seems like it'll be little old me who will have to teach you the ins and outs of a kitchen, Ms. Cavendish." Granted, Akko herself was far from being a _connoisseur_ of  the culinary arts, but she could handle herself around a stove. The real reason her diet was so poor in variety was because she was too lazy to cook most of the time, preferring to pilfer snacks and other canned, wrapped or bagged goods. "And thus the student becomes the teacher." 

Diana merely rolled her eyes. "I suppose. Where should we start? Shall we grind wheat and prepare dough for the hearth?"

"Hearth?" Akko looked around and, sure enough, a well-kept but still very much antique stone hearth stood in a corner, a relic of the original structure of the house that survived renovations. Of course a traditionalist family such as the Cavendishes would own something so old-fashioned. "God, no, I think we left the 18th century a while ago."

The blonde crossed her arms and inquired the brunette. "Then what do you propose, Akko?"

The brunette promptly set herself to rummage through the cabinet doors until she found the set of appliances she was looking for, though not before getting a pile of pans to tumble on top of her thick skull (it was going to leave quite a bump). Still rubbing the sore spot on her calf, Akko proudly presented, with a loud 'ta-dah!' and an 'ow owie my poor head', what she'd procured - a paralelepipedal, metal-covered object, with two slots on its top, a lever on its side and some buttons. The other object seemed like a simple transparent vase atop a plastic support that also held command buttons. 

"Meet Mr. Toasty and Ms. Blendy, Diana." The heiress in question cocked her head sideways, not used to seeing or dealing with electronic appliances of any sort. Her understanding of the world was firmly built on top of the realm of magic, one very distinct from the sphere of the modern word. She was forced to admit that this fact, coupled with her being somewhat of a Luddite, left her knowledge of the most recent technological marvels the last decades had brought forward rather lackadaisical. 

"What are the purposes of these apparels?" 

Akko tapped the first block-like appliance, coated with a reflective silver exterior. "This, my pupil, is a toaster. You know what they say: all toasters toast toast!" The brunette's voice deepened a bit, as though doing an impression of some Italian character. She chuckled to herself, amused at the meme her friend would never be able to comprehend. "Basically, you take a slice of bread, put it inside one of these slots, and then the magic happens and you get nice toast. Like, crispy bread that you can use butter or whatever on to make it tasty."

"I _know_ what toast is, Akko. I prefer blueberry jam to accompany mine. Though, I admit I hadn't ever stopped to ponder on how it's prepared." Diana was now by her guest's side, observing the gadget with curious but calculating eyes over her left shoulder, as though she were trying to discern what kind of magic was behind its functioning. "Well, what of the other one?"

Akko skipped backwards quite comically on one foot over to the blender, giving the cup a light slap and displaying it as though she were a salesman. "This is a blender. This bad girl can fit so many hecking fruits in it!" She laughed again, mentally high-fiving herself for the joke. She was on a roll today. Diana, of course, couldn't even begin to understand the girl's internet-based humor and decided to brush it aside instead of prodding.

"Basically, you put a bunch of stuff inside the cup and this thingy," she pointed to the blade at the bottom of the cup, "turns it all into a delicious pulp of whatever! I personally like to make strawberry juice with it."

"Hmm." Diana nodded. "Well, it's clear who between the two of us is more adequate for preparing our breakfast. Though it bothers me to ask this favor as someone who's supposed to be your host." She blinked in surprise when the brunette, eyes fiery, grabbed her wist and smirked, showing some teeth.

"That's great, then, 'cuz today is your lucky day! You're going to learn how to use these, Diana dearest." 

Warily, the blonde eyed the appliances, as though they were dangerous animals waiting to pounce on her. "I'm not so sure, Akko. I am not accustomed to anything of the sort."

"Oh, come on, I ain't gonna hear that out of _you_ of all people, Di-Di." Diana's nose turned a bit in embarrassment at the pet name. "If anyone can learn a new ability, that's you, egghead."

But the blonde wasn't yet ready to surrender. "That's because my abilities as a witch are rooted in the history of my family and the magic passed down with each generation. I fear I may not be able to handle, well, this." She retorted, though she sounded far less sure than she pretended to be. "I can't do it."

' _Okay, time to use the big guns, Atsuko Kagari._ '

Akko slouched every so slightly, puppy eyes dropping to the ground and tag-teaming with a remarkably dejected and furrowed brow. Her lips formed the most adorable pout. "Not even for your very cute and precious guest?"

The Cavendish stammered, trying to formulate a retort. Once a couple moments were wasted without one, it was clear the battle had been decided. When the blonde sighed, Akko knew her secret weapon hit the bulls-eye. "I suppose. Perhaps I am being obstinate in not trying to learn more about the non-magical sphere of information. It _is_ a new age of magic after all and it would be irresponsible not to dwell in it."

"Yay!" Akko pumped a fist and jumped a bit off the ground, excitement in her veins. "Alright, you go get some fruits and bread from the pantry while I get anything else we may need." Still looking reluctant, the blonde agreed. Both parted their ways to accomplish their tasks.

Inside the pantry, which was magically enchanted to be colder than outside so as to preserve food, Diana allowed herself another frustrated sigh. She was feeling somewhat uncomfortable with having to face the fact that not only had she been neglecting an important field of knowledge due to her unfounded prejudice against the non-magical world, but the realization that she'd become too used to being catered for. Spoiled, really. Oh, Nines, the supposedly top student of Luna Nova - someone who wasn't even able to prepare a breakfast for her guest. That was a shame that filled her insides with a sour feeling, churning. She was glad Akko was willing to teach her, despite how obstinate she'd been presenting herself.

She had to learn to be more receptive of ideas not her own. To think she'd belittled the Asian so much for her lack of magical knowledge. If only Diana knew, on that first day, just how much the budding entrepreneur had to teach her. 

 

* * *

 

Back to the kitchen, having retrieved the requested items, Diana found her companion had plugged both of the home appliances to outlets on the wall as well as acquired other items they might need for Diana's first outing in the art of breakfasting - jars of jam, drinking cups, a sieve and so on. "Heya there, chef! _Rrready_ to _worrrk_  that kitchen magic?" Akko made sure to draw out her rhotics out obnoxiously in a pseudo French accent.

"As ready as I'll ever be, I suppose." The blonde placed the pack of sliced bread and a bag of fruits on the counter. "So, where do we start, _sensei_?" Diana spoke, deciding that she might as well join in on the antics.

"Now, that's what I'm talking about, little _kouhai_!" The breakfast-master straightened her back, trying to look confident. "First, my apprentice, you take two slices of bread out of the bag. Yeah, like tha- no, no, put the first slice aside, it's the weird one."

Diana followed the instructions, each hand now holding a slice of wheat byproduct goodness. "So, how shall I proceed?"

"Well, the truth is this is really simple. You just need to insert each slice into a slot," the girl's callous fingers wrapped around the pale and soft skin of Diana's wrist, guiding her hand to the upside of the toaster. Diana felt a strange sensation in her lower belly when they made contact, but tried not to dwell on it.

"Now, you leave the toast aligned with the slot and just drop it!" Diana's fingers let go from the slice, which neatly fell in place in its designated spot. The other slice met the same fate in the adjunct slot. "Alright, good job. Now, how toasted do you want them to be?"

"I would prefer mine at medium well."

With her pointer finger, Akko indicated a wheel with five numbers that resembled a rotary dial. "Alright, then set this to number four - under this little arrow - and push the lever down." With a nod, the instructions were fulfilled. Diana stared curiously as the slices disappeared into the inside of the machine.

"Now we leave those two cooking and move on to making some delicious vitamin! What do you got?"

Diana foraged the bag for the items, showing Akko a plastic pack of strawberries, a small but plump papaya and a bunch of bananas. The sight of the latter elicited a chuckle from Akko, who poked the squishy peel of one of the bananas. The heiress seemed confused. "What's so funny if I may inquire?"

"Are you some sort of _cannibal_ , Diana Cavendish?" 

Oh, of course, the infamous Cavendish banana routine. She had been through this situation before, so she just smiled defiantly, acting unfazed.

"Ha, ha. If you think yourself to be the first to tell me this joke, Atsuko, you're sorely mistaken and I'll have you know it doesn't affect me in the slightest." 

"T-then, can I call you Diana Banana?" The brunette's hand was above her mouth as she desperately tried not to burst out laughing.

After a few moments, her hazy, tear-filled eyes cleared enough and her crimson eyes caught the gaze Diana gave her. Her azure irises were deep, cold and menacing, sending a chill of fear down the foolish Japanese witch's spine.

"No."

Akko bit her lower lip and nodded, a bit lost between the conflicting feelings of loving her own joke and the fear of swift, aristocrat-based death.

"A-anyway, so I think we're making a vitamin mix. We shouldn't need more than two bananas and half that big orange thing." Sadly, her non-native English skills failed in describing the fruit. "Remove the peel and slice it all in little slices or cubes. I'll cut the strawberries." Orders given, both directed their attention to their chores.

Removing the peel from the papaya proved to be far harder than Diana expected, with her knife constantly cutting off too little - leaving some of the peel in that spot intact - or too much off the surface, cutting off from the fruit beneath it. Plus, removing the seeds was also tricky and the texture was unpleasant. But lo-and-behold, she finished her task just as Akko was pouring milk into the blender's cup.

The brunette smiled at the Brit's handiwork. "Hey, good going! It's so…" Her left eyebrow raised as she glanced at the slices, seemingly perfect copies of each other that appeared as though they'd been precisely cut with a laser. "…symmetrical?" Diana, ever the perfectionist, seemed pleased with the compliment, somewhat like a child receiving a golden star for making a cute stick figure drawing. 

"Okay, how sweet would you like your vitamin?"

"Not much, if you will."

"Alright." Akko set aside the sugar bowl she'd placed on the counter since they wouldn't need it. She raised her cutting board, full of strawberries she'd washed and sliced the leaves out of, and pushed them into the blender's cup with her knife, motioning for Diana to follow suit. And although some slices of papaya slid off the edge and sploshed against the counter, creating a small mess on the previously tidy surface that Diana mentally chastised her uncharacteristically clumsy self for, the task was soon done.

The brunette seemed pleased with their teamwork. "Very well, young padawan. I shall give you the honor of blending the first version of the great concoction that is the Kagari-Cavendish Sweet Fruity Drink - patent pending." 

"I'm sure our foray into the beverage industry will be phenomenal," Diana responded slyly. She saw another dial forming an arch of growing numbers on the machine. "So, is this how you activate it?" When she received a nod, the blonde reached out her hand towards the plastic cylinder.

"Oh, but you have to place the lid fir-"

One moment later and Diana found herself shrieking along with her partner in culinary, her hair and body covered with baby pink juice that seemed resolute in finding its way into as much of her eyes and mouth as it could. The blender rattled on the counter, a mechanical beast, still very much turned on and sputtering liquid everywhere in its vicinity. Akko was trying to clean the goop off her eyes, stumbling. "Ah, fuck! Give me a second, Diana, I'll turn it off!"

Panic coursed through the eastern girl as the idyllic morning they'd been sharing went downhill and started to become akin to an usual Akko Moment™, though this time it was the consequence of someone else's actions. Her hand reached for the dial, but in her sweet-addled confusion, instead of turning the appliance off, all she ended up doing was shoving the blender off the counter. It fell to the floor, loud and furious as it spitted its sugary blood and roared its teeth.

Teeth that, in fact, found a very delectable prey in the form of the hem of Diana's nightgown. The poor prodigy, still fighting to get her bearings, yelped as she felt the fabric of her outfit being sucked into the metallic whirlpool. In panic, she tugged the fabric and tried pulling at it before she herself ended up as prey of the scary technological contraption - it wasn't going to happen, but having a _very_ loud machine she had zero idea how to deal with eating her gown derailed the intelligent witch's rationale.

Grasping the counter, now able to clearly see again, Akko tugged at the cable and unplugged the blender from the wall, silencing the hungry whirring beast. "Whew, what a reli-"

However, in a very cartoon-like manner, Diana found herself tripping back and slipping on the vitamin-soaked floor following the sudden lack of resistance from the tug-of-war with the blender. She managed to hold herself on the counter so she wouldn't fall to the floor, but due to that, her elbow hit the toaster with all the momentum of her fall. The gadget crashed on one of its sides, just as the lever pulled up and shot two slices of toast at the Cavendish's face.

The two girls stood in silence following the episode, which, if filmed, would have had Yakety Sax superimposed onto it before being posted on YouTube. With a sigh, Diana collected the offending pieces of grain-based food off her face and set them on a plate, forlorn at how badly this attempt had turned out. "I owe Anna many apologies. I knew I should've just waited for service."

Her sadness was momentarily forgotten when she received a rather sloppy embrace from Akko, who was also soaking wet from the vitamin assault. "Hey, it's fine." The hug was quite comforting.

Diana smiled, pleased that the situation at least turned into a positive moment of bonding. "I suppose you're right, this was but a small accident. Par for the course." In truth, she wasn't really convinced. Her somewhat low self-esteem and self-imposed expectations made it hard to brush failures off. "I promise I'll remember to put the lid next time." The pair shared a hearty laugh, cleaning away the tension.

"I'll help you clean. And hey," Akko proposed with a toothy grin, "at least we still have the toast left! This could've been worse."

There was a crackle and a burst of bright orange light.

Diana and Akko, who felt warmth bathing their faces, turned slowly in horror. After the impact, the toaster's plug had become half-stuck to the outlet and short-circuited. The kitchen was currently on fire.

Both screamed and skidded a few feet backwards. Diana, her knight-like protective instincts kicking in, grabbed Akko by her wrist and dragged the girl behind her, acting as a wall to separate the brunette from the still small but growing fire. "Akko, protect yourself, I'm going to put this fire out!" 

Whipping out her wand, which she'd kept in one of her nightgown's pockets, Diana summoned green mana into the tip and prepared a spell. Realizing what her friend was about to do, Akko tried to stop her.

" _DIANA, WAIT, NO! YOU CAN'T USE WATER TO PUT OUT AN ELECTRICAL F-_ "

 

* * *

 

It was rather cold outside, Diana found while sitting on the neatly mowed grass outside the Cavendish manor. The smell of dew was familiar and comforting. The cold morning breeze danced around her thin neck.

Her hair was frazzled and she was still covered in vitamin. She had a blanket draped over her shoulders, courtesy of the firemen who arrived at the scene quickly, much to her relief. Not that this feeling could wash away the guilt she felt, knowing she'd placed the property of her family, a long-standing architecture charged with history and meaning, in jeopardy due to her ineptness. 

' _You've really gone and done it, Diana. What would mother think of your tomfoolery? She raised you better._ '  

"Hey, I got us some drinks," said a familiar tone, cutting right through her brooding. Akko sat by her side, holding out a drink she recognized as belonging to a coffee store chain.

"Hmm. I wasn't aware you liked coffee, Akko."

"And I don't! I got hot chocolate." The brunette smiled sheepishly, a bit embarrassed by her childish tastes, before taking a sip of the hot and sweet drink, sighing contentedly afterwards.

Diana chuckled before looking down sadly. "I suppose it'll work as asubstitute for the breakfast I ruined." She wasn't expecting to get everything right on her first go, but starting a fire and then inadvertently fueling it was past embarrassing - it was a complete humiliation. Few times had Diana ever felt so small and low - a bad cook, inept host and a foolish friend. 

She shivered when Akko's hand touched her back, rubbing comforting circles on her cold skin. The sensation of being touched by the brunette was still rather electrical. A rather fitting, if sardonic, play of words. 

"Well, I guess we'll still have to grab something to eat. But come on, at least the fire didn't spread outside the kitchen! It isn't the end of the world, Dia."

"Perhaps not," the Brit conceded. "But I will never hear the end of this from my family." Or her own conscience. 

The Japanese girl clicked her tongue. "I could always take the blame, y'know? It's not like they wouldn't believe it with my track record." But her answer was a shake of the head from Diana.

"Absolutely not. I will not let others take fault for my actions. And I especially owe you such after I failed in crediting you for being the one who hatched the Papilliodya." Diana hugged her knees. The self-hatred she'd repressed through the compliments and admiration of others was filling her soul, and it was a horrible feeling Diana thought she wouldn't need to deal with again. But here she was. ' _Pathetic._ '

"Hey," Akko spoke with somewhat of a stern tone, prompting Diana to look at her. "I'm not an academic nerd like you, but life has taught me a lot of stuff! What I learned is that we all mess up a lot and it's okay. Even the perfectest girl, like you, can mess up! As long as we're determined to be better and, like, act humble in front of things we don't understand or aren't able to do yet, it should be fine." She showed her right leg, a galaxy full of constellations made of small scars - a relic of her incessant determination to become a witch. "We gotta trip every now and then to learn stuff, Di. Sure, this one was uh…" Her crimson eyes diverted for a second to the smoke rising from the back of the manor. "A quite big one, I'll give you that, but it's not like I haven't done way worse."

"That much is true," Diana teased. She was already feeling better. Such was the power of Akko's optimism, reminding her of her need to be open-minded and humble. Maybe she shouldn't be so hard on herself after all.

"Hey, you didn't have to agree!" Akko pouted, mocking dejection. "Besides, even if I never got to eat that toast…" the brunette leaned in, close to the girl's cheek, and gave her a peck. Diana gasped. "You are super sweet, especially with all that vitamin juice on you!"

Akko's sudden boldness was whisked away in milliseconds as she took notice of Diana's pinprick-sized eyes and came to realize what she'd just said and done. Both looked away from each other, faces flushing crimson.

"…Can we just pretend I never did that?"

"Y-yes. Let's."

But, although surprised, Diana didn't feel uncomfortable - far from it, in fact. The kiss reignited that same warm feeling from earlier. She placed an open palm on the spot that had been graced by Akko's lips, the skin still somewhat warm. 

' _Perhaps, Akko, but I believe you're sweeter._ '

 

…

 

They ate muffins later at a Starbucks while sitting shoulder to shoulder, in case you were wondering. It was quite gay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not sure if I'll continue this.
> 
> For those of you who are waiting for an update on The Day Luna Nova Went Gay (all -3 of you), I'm delaying the next chapter due to a bit of a creative block. Shouldn't take too long but I won't make any specific promises on dates.


End file.
